1st Bad Experience with World Wide Corals

[Apollo7235]

I am so completely disappointed. Let me preface by saying I have never had anything but great experiences with @WWC up to this point, but this is a pretty big misstep.

TLDR: I was sold Babylonian Nassarius Snails as ‘Super Nassarius Snails’ and they bulldozed my corals, ate one of my Astraea Snails, and literally attempted to eat my Tiger Pistol. My Bullseye Pistol is also missing, but that is still to be determined.

I visited the Orlando location yesterday to pick up some new members for my clean-up crew. I was completely undecided on which way to approach this, so I placed my trust and confidence in one of the WWC staff to help me with my choices.

I explained that I have a lot of NPS and I feed heavy, so I need something to clean up after them. The person helping me recommended some ‘Super Nassarius Snails’ amongst other things. I had remembered reading about snails commonly being sold as these supposed ‘Super Nassarius Snails’ while acually being something far different, but considering the respect I have for WWC, I decided to trust this guy and go ahead with the purchase. I also verified with him that 3 of these snails would not be too many for my 38-gallon and that they would not starve to death or bother my LPS/NPS. He reassured me all would be well.

Upon releasing these guys, they immediately burrowed into the sand, which I took to be a good sign for Nassarius snails, so I let them be. Come feeding time, all hell broke loose. Not only did these snails bulldoze the corals I had placed in my sand bed, but they literally tried to steal the food from their mouths.

I decided that things would eventually settle down once I got my corals out of the sand bed and up onto the rocks, but boy was I wrong.

This morning I came prepared for the frenzy and target fed the snails in a location opposite my NPS to distract them while the corals ate. This backfired.

This location happened to be within the vicinity of my pistol shrimp and goby and I seriously would not have believed this if I hadn’t seen it with my own two eyes but one of these hellion snails actually went head to head with my tiger pistol/goby pair! I actually had to help them fight the dang thing off as it was literally ON TOP of my pistol!

At this point, I got online looking for what the heck these crazy things could be. For some reason, I remembered reading something about killer snails in one of the R2R articles on cleanup crews and these guys were ringing some bells......

After looking on the WWC website, this is what I found:



Needless to say these little buggers are now in a ziploc bag floating in one of my QT tanks. Shortly after I pulled them, I noticed one of my Spiny Astraeas has mysteriously been picked clean and my Bullseye Pistol is missing. I still find this so hard to believe so I am having trouble blaming these snails for the disappearance of my Bullseye, but that is literally the only predatory thing I (accidentally) added to my tank. Hopefully it just wasn’t hungry this morning and shows up later today.

I called WWC and explained the situation. I am taking them back to the store tomorrow if I don’t throw the dang things in the frying pan first.
I will update with the solution after I take them back tomorrow.

 

[vtecintegra]

I looked around and it seems like these babylonian snails are wrongly being called nassarius.

From Reef Cleaners:

• Babylonian Snails - This cream and brown spotted snail makes an attractive addition to the tank, but are predatory and feed on bivalves and other snails. They are often mislabeled and sold as "Fancy Nassarius", or "Speckled Nassarius" snails, but they are not related to Nassarius spp. and may consume sessile invertebrates.

And what the heck is a Super Nassarius Snail?

 

[Staghorn]

It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s a demon predator snail!

 

[Apollo7235]

It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s a demon predator snail!

No kidding!

I prepared myself for the many surprises that are known to come with reefing, but killer snails were not one of them

 

[Apollo7235]

I looked around and it seems like these babylonian snails are wrongly being called nassarius.

From Reef Cleaners:

• Babylonian Snails - This cream and brown spotted snail makes an attractive addition to the tank, but are predatory and feed on bivalves and other snails. They are often mislabeled and sold as "Fancy Nassarius", or "Speckled Nassarius" snails, but they are not related to Nassarius spp. and may consume sessile invertebrates.

And what the heck is a Super Nassarius Snail?

Right? The thought of it sounds so appealing until you find out the dang thing has teeth! Hahaha

Well, lesson learned. Hopefully other folks weren’t sold the same thing under that name! That WWC guy obviously needs some edumacation.

 

[Apollo7235]

Made a trip to WWC today and they took back the killer snails.

In exchange, they gave me a tiger tail sea cucumber, big mistake on my part because I am 100% not ready for one. Currently, it's sitting in my fish QT until I figure out what the heck to do with it.

Overall, I am satisfied with the resolution, however I wish I would have just asked for a refund rather than accepting the exchange.